Adolphe F. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Adolphe F., who was born in Paris, France in 1926. He recounts a sheltered childhood; his parents' unionism and communism; he and his parents hiding with a French family in July 1942; fleeing with an uncle to Vierzon, using false papers; their denouncement; imprisonment in Orle?ans; transfer to Pithiviers, Drancy, and then back to Pithiviers; deportation as hostages to Cosel, then a labor camp; brief escapes to obtain food; transfer to Blechhammer in December 1942; beatings, slave labor, appels, and public hangings; sharing food received from his parents; assistance from a German official; working with British POWs; a Czech worker giving him extra food; helping each other during the death march to Gross-Rosen in January 1945; transfer to Buchenwald, then Langenstein; hiding to avoid work; escaping the evacuation with a few friends; liberation by United States troops; hospitalization in Magdeburg; repatriation to Paris; reunion with his parents; and a difficult physical and emotional recovery. Mr. F. eloquently discusses various prisoner roles and responses in camps; the solidarity of the French prisoners and friendships which enabled him to survive and sustained him after the war; joining an organization of Blechhammer survivors in 1965; and relations with his children.

3 videocassettes